Naspers leads a $124 million round into marketplace firm Movile

Movile, one of the global leaders in mobile marketplaces, announces a new round of investment led by Naspers with participation by Brazilian investment fund, Innova Capital. The round marks the largest in the company’s history, with a combination of primary and secondary investment totaling US$124 million dollars. The fresh capital will be used for the expansion of several of the group’s companies, including Zoop and Sympla, in addition to scaling iFood’s business with an investment in logistics.

Since Movile’s last round of capital of US$82 million in December 2017, the company has itself invested in two startups including Mercadoni, a Colombian grocery business, and Zoop, which specializes in payment services. The investments marked the company’s first in the grocery and fintech segments.

“Movile wants to increasingly foster the global ecosystem of innovation. By focusing our energy into the logistics, tickets and payments segments, we’ll boost iFood, Sympla and Zoop’s scalability potential and impact the daily experiences of even more customers,”explains Helisson Lemos, Movile’s COO.

For Fabricio Bloisi, Movile’s CEO, the investment will help the company get closer to the big dream of its more than 1,600 employees: making lives better for one billion people through thecompany’s applications. “The culture of the Movile team is that we think big, act fast and are always striving for growth. The DNA of entrepreneurship, collaboration and innovation are present in every part of our ecosystem. Our company’s big dream, culture and DNA propel us to expand our portfolio of companies, contribute to the growth of these businesses and offer real results to our own investors. We also want to be an example in Latin America, showing startups that there is space here to grow locally and globally.”

According to Martin Tschopp, COO of Naspers Ventures and Movile board member, “Naspers has been a long-term partner of Movile because ofits ability to build transformative mobile businesses in Latin America and beyond. Movile has great expertise in identifying high-potential companies in consumer segments with opportunity for massive growth, including food delivery with iFood, which is why we continue to support the company.”

Since its foundation, Movile has raised more than US$375 million. The capital has been used to expand the company’s own businesses, in addition to the acquisition and investments in more than 20 companies including PlayKids, Sympla, iFood, MapLink, Apontador, SuperPlayer, Mercadoni and Zoop, among others.